Sometimes You Can't Make It On Your Own
by Makosi
Summary: My take on Sawyer's thoughts a few days after the end of Confidence Man! Dedicated to H you know who you are. The U2 song is borrowed like the characters


Staring at the waves crashing against the beach didn't change what had happened. It didn't stop him thinking about the look on her face as she'd walked away. Sure, it wouldn't even magic up a plane to get him off his damned island, or at least one that wouldn't just crash more passengers on to it?

Finally it seemed that he had succeeded in driving away someone who had really cared about him. But just how surprised should he really be though? He'd pushed her to her limit so naturally she snapped. What was it inside him that had driven him to repeat the cycle of emotional sado-masochism that had powered his life?

The answer to the rhetorical question was obvious. It hurt far less if you destroyed something before it broke of its own accord, or someone else's. Opening your heart up to others really meant laying out the cloth of your dreams knowing it could be torn into shreds or cherished and valued. There was a certain comfort in the certainty of knowing how things were going to turn out 'With a heart of stone you have real protection' like Cher had sung. Though he was more fond of groups like Def Leppard, AC/DC and L7 he could see where the old canary teasing the hungry young toms in the 'Turn Back Time' video had come from. Sure Cher was better looking than that rich bitch who had drugged a naive teenager into offering up his virginity to her on a pudding plate heavy with brandy fumes.

Early adult experience had reinforced the lesson that when it came to women or men, seldom did they see or want to, beyond the cut abs and the southern gentleman's charm; his mother had worked so hard to instill into him. In their eyes he was a piece of flesh to be devoured, savored, then discarded once they'd had their fill. So why shouldn't he make his looks work for him instead of against him? That he read with a keen objective eye whatever interested him from John Jakes to JRR Tolkien and had managed to get a degree in Finance (which he always said was counterfeit) were things he preferred to keep to himself even here.

Yet he wasn't safe even here from thoughts of lust or was it more than that? Kate's reluctance to play by his rules had stirred his curiosity to boiling point. He just had had to know whether her behavior towards him was her using him as bait to tease Jack into admitting he liked her, or was there something more between them?. When an opportunity arose with the mysterious case of the disappearance of Malibu Barbie's inhalers he seized it to see to see whether or not his senses were playing cruel and unusual tricks on him.

The kiss had given him the sweetest searing orgasm that he had had in many a day. The thought of Kate and him being able to explore each other's bodies fully and imagining how he could set her soul aflame had raised the temperature of the embers of his heart. Since he'd landed on this island, his world view had been stirred and shaken into a very dirty martini. He wondered though whether he could have continued to live in ever decreasing circles around the pillars of hate, self-doubt, and masochism that had been the landmarks of his life before the crash.

Maybe the damned island was allowing him something good and sweet for once? Hope was beginning to eat away at his doubts. He reflected again on whether things might for once turn out to his favor, even after his dismissal of Kate's attempt to get him to open up to her about his past life. Craphole island was a catalyst for very strange things. Perhaps there was still he could work things out still with Kate. If she had not cared, she would not have approached him again after their kiss: he seized the fact that she had been watching him too, he didn't think she would have feigned interest in him for so long, as even Dr Do-Right wasn't worth playing a long-con for.

Thinking back over events he realised that he had experienced that painful moment of catharsis when you realise the effect of your bad behaviour on others and how it comes across. Truly, he was scared to explore how as EM Forster put it just what happened when the prose and the passion between two people truly connected. The frightened little boy inside him would do what he could to try to do anything to maintain his unhappy equilibrium. Yet realising this, he could and did not want to bring himself to stop thinking about her or was it that he just didn't plain want to? Reliving the kiss in the jungle stung him as much as it thrilled the marrow in his bones. Yet would she ever have kissed him if he had not forced the issue?

She had returned his kiss with such intensity. The cynicism that had fettered his heart for so long was shattered into shards like Anduril's strike against Melkor. Yet, even then he could not lose himself in the moment and surrender to the power of the connection between them: the thought of something so good and sweet on this island was too much for his weary heart to bear. He had to start thinking about that old devil called love. What lay between between him and Freckles was more than a rush of frenzied rutting and a heap of recriminations. It meant that he couldn't bring himself to free his hands from the bonds that he'd already loosened in case Dr Do-Right and Saywhat decided to up the ante on the torture stakes further. It would go against her trust in him if he seized this opportunity to caress the toned curves of her figure, or sweep away her hair. The pleasure that he could bring her for one afternoon if he could brush his lips against her neck, lift her vest to worship her and kiss...

The pain from his arm dragged him back to the here and the now. He looked at the watch and realised that Dr Quinn was due soon for his daily visit with antibiotics and barely-concealed anger. Well, well, who knew that Jack had it in him to just stand by and watch a man tortured and an innocent man at that? Hey the man could actually think bad and evil thoughts too, maybe Dudley Do-Right actually had more than one layer? That would teach him for being such a jerkoff. Next time he wanted to go play torture a prisoner, he'd better consider whether or not the man was actually innocent. Hell he even fancied Kate too, why should the hero always get the girl? Maybe he should start rewriting the story after all and the sooner the better?

He wiped his eyes off on his shirt. The thought of Jack seeing him crying would be more than he could bear. Other people pitying him set his skin on edge. No animals ever saw the lion in the jungle sashaying around in a fit of daytime soap anguish. Wincing in pain he edged himself off the airplane seat in his shelter and started edging towards the shore to wash his face.


End file.
